ThromboStep:

Diagnostic kit designed to quantify platelet associated immunoglobulin using flow cytometry.

The kit contains an R-phycoerythrin (R-PE) conjugated monoclonal antibody, which recognizes a platelet specific antigen.
The kit also contains polyclonal antibodies conjugated whit fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) against total human immunoglobulins, human IgA, IgM and IgG
The kit contains a polyclonal antibody conjugated whit FITC as a negative control.

Platelet associated immunoglobulin detection by flow cytometry.

Platelet autoantibody detection is critical for immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) diagnosis and prognosis, and that is the reason why we will need an assay for the quantification of platelet-associated immunoglobulins. Immunostep provide a highly sensitive assay with this purpose using flow cytometry.

More information

Figure 1: Immune Thrombocytopenia. The histograms represent comparison of a healthy control sample (1) and immune thrombocytopenia sample (2).

Immune Thrombocytopenia

Generally, a normal platelet count in humans ranges from 150.000 and 450.000 per ul. Thrombocytopenia is the presence of relatively few platelets in blood. Decreased platelet counts can be due to a number of disease processes, the quantification of platelet associated immunoglobulin allow to the cause of thrombocytopenia is decreased ratio in platelet production or an increase in the ratio of destruction.

Highly specific evaluation of thrombocytopenia.

Immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) is an autoimmune disorder characterised by a low platelet count and mucocutaneous bleeding. The autoantibodies are directed primarily to the platelet-specific receptors CD41a (GPIIb/IIIa) and CD42b (GPIb).

As a result, the sensitized platelets are rapidly cleared by the monocyte-macrophage cell systems. The determination of autoantibodies against thrombocytes allows differentiate immune from nonimmune thrombocytopenia.

Figure 2: kit specificity assessment. Anti-human Igs were incubated respectively with human immunoglobulins IgA, IgG and IgM and BSA (control) coated polystyrene beads.

Anti-human Igs specificity analysis shows a very low cross-reactivity (>7%) for all of them, making easy the correct identification of non-pathological samples.